The “Singer/Songwriter” Vest

Time to complete: Who knows? In fact, I’m not putting this into future posts. I really don’t keep track because my sewing is broken up into small bits due to real life intruding. A seam here and there.

First worn: August 13, 2012

Wear again?: Yes

Total price: $0

Here’s the problem with this challenge–the musicians I really like are not super stylish and tend to wear pretty bland clothing (often black, often t-shirts, always something you could find at Target). On the other hand, there are several bands and singers I like that are more trendy, but after perusing pics on the vast Interwebs I realized that almost all of them are really risque or downright slutty. Hmmm… But one theme seemed to keep popping up no matter where I looked: vests.

Any era, almost every genre, musicians love the vest. Usually black. Sometimes leather. And I happen to have a vest pattern and a bunch of suitable (see what I did there?) black fabric languishing in the stash. This was a super easy pattern, though I find it a little strange that the collar doesn’t extend all around the back of the neck–it’s just on the front. Weird. And I’m always fascinated when lined garments are inside out and then pulled through shoulders and sides and are suddenly right side out. I can’t imagine how pattern makers get their minds around those fabric gymnastics.

In the past year or so I’ve picked up some guitar skills (though I’d still call them pretty rudimentary). My husband and I take turns putting our son to bed each night and every night he gets serenaded with guitar music. I can only play a few songs moderately well, but my husband’s repertoire is quite large since he’s been playing for more than half his life. I made sure to tell our boy recently how lucky he is to get this royal treatment. For his part, he has shown great interest in making music noise himself.

Rockin’ out to some cleaned up Green Day.

Anyway, my guitar is not merely a prop. I can really play it. The piano? Not so much…

I can play melody lines, but both hands at once is very difficult for me and I never practiced enough to easily do chords without thinking very hard about where to put each finger.

I still have LOTS of this fabric left and will eventually be making a pencil skirt and some trousers (that’s for you Brits out there) to go with the waistcoat (that too).

22 Comments

Oh, I’m telling your piano teacher you sat on the piano ;) Mine would have smacked my hands with the pointer. AUgh, the funny things you remember as a kid. I love your black and white photos, they set the perfect mood for musical theme. A vest is such a handy item to the wardrobe. Rock on Family!!

That was a great idea to avoid all the slutty outfits. ;) I like that vest quite a lot, particularly that shawl collar…although it is a bit strange that it doesn’t go around the neck. It doesn’t look bad though – it’s just unusual (which again is good).

Erin, great inspiration for your black vest. It really does seem to be a staple in a musician’s wardrobe. Your black and white photostory was so entertaining. I think I can actually hear you playing. Kudos to your fine work!

Thanks!! One of my big problems was that I like so many male musicians, and a strangely high percentage of women musicians I like are lesbians and they often wear menswear! Not a lot to choose from. Though, I guess what I made is sort of like menswear after all. Too funny.

I love your waistcoat!! I’m a real anglophile, so I’ve always thought waistcoat sounded cooler than vest ;o) I hadn’t realized what a musician staple this was until you pointed it out. I’m getting a montage of vest wearers playing across my memory.

What a great interpretation of the challenge. Most of my favourite bands wear really boring clothes too, so I had to dig to find something for this challenge (not as good as what you came up with though!).

The atmospheric photography is amazing – you look like an album cover! I wish I could see the details of the waistcoat though.

About the Sew Weekly

The Sew Weekly began as Mena Trott's attempt to document the process of sewing all of her own clothes in 2010. In 2011, four other contributors (Debi Fry, Adey Lim, Veronica Darling & Sarah Gabbart) joined her and for 52 weeks, they sewed based on a particular weekly theme. In 2012, The Sew Weekly became a much larger group blog with over 130 contributors sewing along each week.